confidence

Confidence, and the lack of it, is very easy to identify. Through some warped childhood experiences, my female owner grew up with a defective schema that she is not good enough, unlovable etc etc. A prime candidate for schema-focused therapy, she says. Anyway, over the past year, she had the privilege of being nurtured by many outstanding supervisors and teachers.

Externship supervisor 2 told her repeatedly to trust what she knows and who she is, coz my female owner tended not to realise what she knows, choosing to focus on what she lacks.

Her research supervisor recently, in a work-related discussion, suddenly changed track to tell her that he’s trying to build her confidence through the various things he is getting her to do as a research assistant. That within a year’s time, she would transit from a student to a professional. Hence, she needs to be confident of herself and the decisions she make. My female owner was touched by his efforts.

An even more recent encounter pertains to her flute teacher, whom she met for three times only. He pointed out her confidence issue and egged her to believe in herself. What happened was that he made her play a relatively new piece at a much faster tempo than she had prepared and she gave him an incredulous look (which he responded by saying “don’t give me that look”). However, within a couple of minutes, she reached that tempo and even faster, thus proving his point.

Confidence. Another area to work on, besides her social disengagement.